Summer 2008 Dualstream Day of Zeux Judging Sheets:Malwyn
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----// Summer/Winter July DoZ, 2008 //---- ---+ Topics: +---------------------------------------------------------------- General topic: "Bureaucracy" Specific topic: "Summer 2008 DsDoZ and the End of the World" ---+ Games: +---------------------------------------------------------------- General: 59446 (270/400) : "OPERATION BREAK INTO BUILDING" 61892 ( 75/400) : "The Bureau" 84459 (195/400) : "Monroe Monroe Attorney at LAW" 90556 (---/400) : ### DISQUALIFIED ### Specific: 36825 (238/400) : "DoZing Off" 38887 (160/400) : "The Somewhat dull adventures of GUN GUY" 51921 ( 95/400) : "TRIUMVIRATE OF VILLAINS WHO HAVE TO POOP" 76722 (267/400) : "...76722?" 91210 ( 15/400) : "ODELL MERMAID AND THE END OF THE WORLD" 99348 (204/400) : "NUCLEAR DOOM ...and the DsDoZ?" ---+ Judging, yeah: +--------------------------------------------------------- .... General ................................................................. 59446 : "OPERATION BREAK INTO BUILDING" Bureaucracy! This game was pretty painful and tedious at times, and I'm not really sure if that was intentional. I'm giving it the benefit of the (lack of?) doubt, and assume it was actually an ingenius look into the horrors of bureaucracy, expressed in a medium of sub-par graphics and irritating gameplay. Oh, and elevator music. Theme - 90/100 Drab, boring, redundant and sometimes bizarre, 59446 captures the theme very nicely and expresses it with the same standard. Gameplay - 55/90 "press space to continue" is really the FIRST message you should get in a 'press space' message system, not the second. The arbitrarily slow movement, the having to go through a handful of messages just to get anywhere, the fact that all you had to actually do is get from point A to point B, and weave through a maze of bureaucratic nonsense to get there is, like the theme adherence, either brilliant or utter rubbish. I'm going with 'pretty neat', and the minigames were kind of fun, even if the controls were odd and slow. Graphics - 40/70 The graphics let me down a little. They were good, well, good-ISH, but some parts just seemed lazy and could have been brushed up very easily. The titlescreen looks very half-done in particular, but on the whole they worked nicely for the atmosphere and had good fundamentals. (Custom graphics were unique and appropriate, but the default palette didn't really work too well and there were some bad colour choices, like the carpet contrasting harshly against the foreground). Technique - 30/60 I'm not too sure what the point of the diagonal engine was, and it was implemented kind of weirdly. But it was definitely a nice touch, and the minigames were technically well designed and implemented. I couldn't figure out if the filing cabinets were working or not, but I got the thing eventually, so they weren't so broken as to not work at all. I'm pretty sure I was right and it was wrong when it told me to open the door for the first prime number (2), and it said no. Ah well, it was still pretty neat. Story - 30/50 While I could pretty much see where the game was going to go from the title screen and the theme 'bureaucracy', I liked what was done with it. It was boring, inane and kind of stupid which was the point! I think, anyway. It didn't pretend to be any more thought provoking than a day of zeux, and didn't try to engage me with some sort of wit. It was a dumb joke that got stretched over a whole game, and it worked. Sound - 25/30 The elevator music was suffocatingly dull and brilliant for it. Footsteps and background music, the only thing that could have made it complete would be the sound of telephones ringing. Maybe someone snoring. What was here fit the game more or less perfectly, and bored the hell out of me. Total - 270/400 61892 : "The Bureau" "In 2040, adventuring heroes have become so commonplace it was decided there needed to [be] a bureaucracy to control, regulate and track them. Thus the bureau of heroes formed. You are a recent hire of this bureau, a promising young hero sent out to battle a hideous monster that has been terrorising europe. Or so you've heard. Truth be told, you've not heard of this monster before now, despite how fearsome everyone asserts it is." ...what. Anyway, this game is awful. Theme - 20/100 I have no idea what this has to do with bureaucracy. The popups were annoying and I guess they were metaphor for endless forms to fill out or some crap, but it was just plain irritating. When all the popups are gone (thank christ), I'm suddenly in the middle of a something somewhere, surrounded by people that look like me. Conformity? Maybe. More likely it just had nothing to do with anything and it was just a symptom of the game being -awful-. Gameplay - 5/90 I seemed to be able to move. That's a good thing. Except the RPG battle engine was crap, the movement was FAR too fast, and for some reason I'd been blocked from the F2-menu to slow it down some. So I'm speeding around, banging into people to talk to them, and none of them are talking about anything at all bureaucratic. They're just... THERE. What. Graphics - 30/70 I liked the trees, and the sprites and scenery generally looked very promising. But they were few, and weren't there for very long. Technique - 5/60 Five points for the fact that the movement engine MOVED, in spite of the fact that it was far too fast to move comfortably. Also, measuring milliseconds, hot damn. Story - 5/50 The story was crap. So I read the bit of the end. That was crap as well. The bureaucrats are some evil establishment that needs to be destroyed? Like in... everything, ever? Okay, that's just lame and terrible. I docked five points for bringing ELVES into this abomination. On another note, I've realised what a bitch of a gesture "OH GOD I'M SORRY FOR THIS" is at the end of games like this. If it was "heh, yeah, we ran out of time" or "yeah, it's crap, please be nice, :P", yeah, okay fair enough. But making a terrible game and then "OH GOD FORGIVE THIS TERRIBLE GAME HAVE MERCY etc", as well as blaming this on your teammates is just pathetic. Don't do it. Sound - 10/30 Filler music. Well, it filled the void somewhat, but it's still just whatever was fished out of a random search at freesound or modarchive. Little to no effort whatsoever. Total - 75/400 84459 : "Monroe Monroe Attorney at LAW" I can understand the connection between lawyers and bureaucracy, but this game was just... eh. Theme - 0/100 I don't think I saw anything that had less to do with bureaucracy than this game. Hell, I don't think I saw or read anything that had to do with attorneys? Or... anything, really. Gameplay - 80/90 * The engine and walking around was pretty slick, and jabbing things with a... flagpole? It was fun, but some of the 'bosses' were just too difficult to manoeuvre around with the limited megazeux four-directional dynamics. With all the other games that were either pixel perfect or supported eight directions, this was a little annoying, but I can't begrudge it for not having a feature already given with megazeux. The head blocked my vision too, which was irritating for this kind of gameplay, especially when you're fighting a horde of somethings in an enclosed space. The tightrope thing was cool and innovative. * Apparently there were two other weapons I didn't notice. I wasn't really alerted to these until reading Exo's judgement so I've added another ten points. Neither of the other weapons are as cool as the pole. Graphics - 55/70 These graphics were pretty exemplary. Nice use of colour, space, customchars. The enemies were a little dull and too abstract for my tastes (the little flying saucer shaped one was cute though), and the parallax background was a little too chunky (pixel perfection wouldn't have been too hard to do here, surely) and the roguelike level was a pretty cool and quirky non-sequitur. (Good ASCII beats bad pixelwork, and this game has both good ASCII and good pixelwork). With the sweet 'jabbing' engine, I would have expected a little more flair with the cool flourishes. The levels were a little flat, being a maze of solids and floors with blocks that disappear when you pick up a key, and I guess this was addressed by dropping random custom blocks all over the place which just looked messy, especially when I have no idea what they're supposed to be. This game has no explanation for the graphics or anything else. Also, the title screen was terrible. Technique - 50/60 * The enemies were pretty generic, moving around and trying to kill you, which wasn't particularly imaginative. No cool weapons or special moves, just moving on to the next level. The text engine was neat, if a little jarring, and the 'jab' engine was awesome (especially since it wasn't a sword), The first board wasn't linked properly and this was probably the only game this DoZ that could have used eight-direction gameplay yet didn't have it. A little disappointing, but no big deal. It was playable for the most part. * Again, two extra weapon engines that worked well. 10pts. Story - 0/50 No story, just a quick dive down the rabbit hole to face off with some stuff, for some reason, at some point. Sound - 10/30 Generally pleasant and appropriate sound effects, but the music gets repetitive very quickly, with all the bow-chika-wow crap. I've been using megazeux for a decade now, and practically all the music sounds the same. While this music suits the game a lot of the time, some imagination and fresh beats wouldn be a good plan. Total - 195/400 .... Specific ................................................................ 36825 : "DoZing Off" I'm really quite fond of collections of weird and quirky minigames, and this is pretty much that and not much else. There are six (?) such minigames, all rather inane and as thought provoking as tic-tac-toe, but short and amusing enough for it to just be fun. I liked this game. Theme - 8/20 This game didn't have a whole lot to do with a DoZ or the end of the world, or anything else for that matter. They were both mentioned however, and the faux editor graphics were pretty consistent. Gameplay - 80/120 I thoroughly enjoyed all four seconds of what gameplay was here. I dreaded long-winded games that went nowhere for this DoZ, especially for a topic like this. This was the first game I played and was pleasantly surprised - and soon addicted to these fantastically terrible minigames. Graphics - 50/90 It takes a bit of effort to meticulously recreate the megazeux editor bar. For everything else, oh man, these graphics were just so brilliantly awful I'd mark it higher than if moderate effort were put into them. Very... megazeux graphics, too. This game had a very classic feel to it, and I liked it. Technique - 70/80 The code behind the minigames that made use of it seemed to be pretty tightly stable and snappy. Movement and response was fluid and uhh, trigonometry, hooray. There were some instances where it would have been completely impossible to collect all the bombs or dodge/shoot down the other sprites, so minus some points for not throwing in a few safeguards. Story - 5/50 Story? Five points for the intro screen, which could be considered as being somehow story-like. At least I did. Sound - 25/40 Much like the graphics, the sound and music here ranged from smirk to laugh-out-loud, and while irritating after the first ten minutes, it had a nice, simplistic endearing quality that rounded the game off nicely. Total - 238/400 38887 : "The Somewhat dull adventures of GUN GUY" I must confess for most of this game, essentially everything after the first five minutes, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing or what was going on. I didn't know if the instant-shoot gun engine actually did anything, since no one seemed to be dying, and I finished everything in the editor with a very "what the hell" kind of feeling. Theme - 10/20 There seemed to be an apocalypse going on, and I think I read something about a day of zeux. That's enough for half marks, since I think the rest of the game had something to do with it. Gameplay - 60/120 Jumping about felt awkward and chunky, even by classic megazeux standards. Shooting didn't seem to do much, and the whole thing seemed to be geared toward moving player from start to finish in some irritatingly labyrinthine maze of default graphic blocks and little red people shooting at me. I didn't get to the finish, because I landed on top of an elevator and I apparently ended up in a transport loop of some kind. The inventory system seemed kind of tacked on, even for a game of this classic zeuxian style. I think there were one or two items neither of which I bothered with. A megazeux inventory game with a sidescrolling engine, a crowbar and an oil drum. Come on. Graphics - 50/90 The graphics were pretty neat when they were bothered with, having a nice classic feel with some oldschool zaniness. There wasn't much variation, and the player animations were pretty limited. I don't feel there was much time or effort put into the graphics and could have been drastically improved with another hour or two put into it. Technique - 20/80 The gun engine irritated the hell out of me, jumping was jerkier than it should have been, the animations broke, and the head came off on the lift. Doors could have done with a keypress to enter instead of just jumping on them, and the inventory engine... just, why. Story - 10/50 The three or so grey textboxes that popped up were very much enlightening to the fact that there was really just no plot involved at all. The world was ending, okay, yeah. Everyone had that, and it got them at least ten points. This is the specific topic though, so... whatever. Sound - 10/40 I'll give some points for the fact that there WAS sound, but it was certainly mostly filler. It fit the general feel of the game, being classic megazeux blippy crap, but I found it irritating and something that made the game slightly more grating than if it had been silent. The music suited the game in that the game didn't suit anything. It was arbitrary and composed of pretty terrible elements that came together to form something slightly less terrible. Also, the hilarious sound effects were out of sync enough with poor timing that all humour was lost and it was just noise akin to a bad powerpoint presentation. Total - 160/400 51921 : "TRIUMVIRATE OF VILLAINS WHO HAVE TO POOP" Well this was interesting. Another game in which I had practically no idea what was going on. There were half a dozen game files, and the boards didn't link properly. So I opened up the editor and found a game that with twenty four hours and three teammates should have been *MUCH* less terrible. Theme - 10/20 Since the game didn't really play anywhere, there were only two cinematics to pick out a coherent theme. Neither was particularly helpful, but I seemed to make out something about lancer-x plotting to destroy the world over a DoZ or something. That's enough for ten points, since the theme in question was pretty terrible. Gameplay - 5/120 The menus were horrible (holding down enter? What?) the cinema 'press space to continue' crap was annoying, there was very little that was actually playable, none of which I could access without the editor. Five points for the fact that in about three of the boards over three worlds, you could actually move. In EIGHT directions no less! Graphics - 40/90 I'll be a little more generous, because I saw promise in the cinematic graphics, and the level design of the fire level looked somewhat promising. The rest was an utter mess however, and was pretty much all this game had going for it. Technique - 10/80 The only engine I could see working was the game menu to some extent, and the eight-directional movement. Story - 20/50 I found what story there was to be bland, generic and ultimately headed nowhere. However, it seemed to have more of a basic plot than the rest of the games in the specific topic, so I'm inclined to be a little more forgiving. Sound - 10/40 I usually tend to think that bad sound filler is better than no sound at all in megazeux games, and truly, this game's sound was no more irritating than any of the others'. The lightning effect with the thunder sound irritated me specifically, since it was out of sync enough to not be humorously comical (realism, perhaps?), and the gunshot sound was as irritating as any gritty, 8bit samples of a 'bang' sound (or maybe some radio static) can be. Total - 95/400 76722 : "...76722?" This game's engine is simply brilliant. So perfectly choreographed that it made waiting for the DoZ worthwhile. The game as a whole was a bit less fantastic and more irritating after the first three times played, but it's still enjoyable by itself and a spectacular example of what can be crapped out by lazy DoZ entrants. Or maybe it just looks better in comparison to all the other abominations entered. Theme - 12/20 This game probably has the most to do with the day of zeux and the end of the world out of any of the games, but it was ultimately just "run through, don't die, open the editor because the boss is ridiculously difficult", and for a specific theme, none of it really mattered. And so a very 'no matter' twelve. Gameplay - 90/120 I'm not entirely sure where gameplay ends and technique begins here. The jumping about and limited exploring was fun, as was simply observing the dynamics of the pixel-perfect ascii world. The enemies were bland but solid, although the boss was just freaking insane. And pointless. Suffice to say, I liked the parts of the game where you weren't being attacked or supposed to attack something. Graphics - 85/90 I often consider well-executed ascii graphics to be superior to poorly executed custom graphics, but this took the whole matter even further. Here were some ascii graphics presented in a freaking PIXEL PERFECT engine. The cartoonish feel of the game was really pleasant but could have done a little more in the way of background (even blank chars could be used in this style of game, and could have been used well), and the text engine was just plain neato. Extra points for creative use of ascii characters, minus a few for some bland backgrounds and ugly blocks. At any rate, graphics were this game's best feature at least on account of being intimately linked to the pixel perfect engine. Technique - 55/80 I noticed some bugs (everything dies if you leave a place then return), which were incidentally pretty merciful, considering the relative difficulty of the enemies and my reluctance to bother playing a game where everything will probably kill me if I stand still. The jumping engine was as usual fluid and seamless, but the pixel perfect colour bleeding was a little irritating and could have been dampened with a better use of blocks. The final boss was stupidly difficult and not particularly imaginative. It flew around and shot braces at me, like all the other enemies, and also DID NOT DIE. All in all, a good, moderately polished engine that could have used some imagination and in some cases, common sense. Story - 10/50 The day of zeux was mentioned, and the world was apparently ending. Ten points to ravenclaw. Sound - 15/40 I found the music and sound effects hilarious when I first played, and didn't mind that all of them were the audio equivalent of having a family of beetles nesting in one's eardrum. But then I kept playing, and the sounds just got more grating. I would have started with a 25 for the quirkiness of voice-acted megazeux music, but it slipped consistently as long as I played it. If the loops were a little longer, it mightn't have been so horrible, and the sound effects were neat. Total - 267/400 91210 : "ODELL MERMAID AND THE END OF THE WORLD DURING THE SUMMER 2008 DUALSTREAM DOZ!" Um. Theme - 0/20 Mermaids apparently don't have much to do with the world ending or the day of zeux. Unless merfolk are causing global warming in order to raise sea levels and invade coastal regions. Gameplay - 5/120 There was some swimming involved. Graphics - 5/90 There were some graphics involved. A mermaid and a background. It would have been quite cool to see with some other scenery. Very... atari 2600. Technique - 5/80 Swimming was clunky, but did work. Story - 0/50 We've addressed the merfolk conspiracy. Sound - 0/40 Glub glub glub. Total - 15/400 99348 : "NUCLEAR DOOM ...and the DsDoZ?" Compared to all the other terrible games that made no effort whatsoever I was pleasantly surprised by this game's complete lack of pretentious 'engines' and efforts to soldier on and present itself as something that, if nothing else, was PLAYABLE from start to finish. Original megazeux elements and primitives to the rescue. Theme - 12/20 Terrible and irrelevant yes, but it gets extra points for having practically nothing to detract from the theme. Gameplay - 50/120 You know what? I enjoyed the gameplay. It didn't break, it had familiar controls and intuitive/expectable workings. Simple, but effective, and I actually enjoyed it to my surprise. Forty five seconds of fun! Graphics - 12/90 Ten points for organising the default megazeux graphics into a level design that didn't make me want to puke, and two points for the custom characters. Both of them. Technique - 50/80 Oh sure, there could have been amazing robotic tricks with sprites and vlayers and partial char sets and full motion video and supermzx engines and balloon rides and watermelon and all the shits and whistles that are all the rage these days. But this crappy little game that looked like CANS played from start to finish, all robots did what they were supposed to and all the boards linked up properly. This game worked BETTER than all that crap. This was one of maybe three games this DoZ that had no bugs to speak of whatsoever. So, 50 points. Story - 25/50 With the perfect gameplay it was easier to make out a clear and concise plot, or something like it anyway. This was a crappy game for a crappy topic and the story was appropriately crappy also. It was not the least bit complex, and it was generic and predictable (again, bad topic) of course, but it worked for me. Sound - 30/40 I actually liked two of the MODs at least, which was refreshing given the other crap in this day of zeux. Blippy and zeuxish, but also CATCHY and something you could really listen to while playing for forty seconds. 51921 and 38887 didn't get this far, so 99348 gets a few extra points. Total - 204/400